Cyber Connections
by Hurt.In.Cnfuzn
Summary: Two Artificial Intelligent beings, TEC and GLaDOS, are so different yet so similar in many ways. This is the story of their encounter, and their journey of romance, adventure, and much, much more!
1. Creation

**Author's Notes:**  
>This Fanfic is a crossover of Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door and PortalPortal 2. The main pairing is TEC/GLaDOS. Rated M for future smuttiness and some violence..

Paper Mario TTYD has been a favorite video game of mine since I was young. I was always a Nintendo freak, and fell in love with this game. This was the first thing I ever fangirled over, before any other book or TV show. This game was such a huge part of my childhood, and TEC was always one of my favorite characters: the machine who wants to learn of love. TEC inspired an AI character in my own original novel, as well as gave me an AI to love while growing up.

A little over a year ago, my boyfriend introduced me to Portal. Again, I am a Nintendo freak, so I wasn't expecting to love the game as much as I do. Instantly, Portal/Portal 2 climbed to my #2 favorite game of all time (Right under TTYD, of course). And again, who the hell plays Portal and doesn't immediately love GLaDOS? The evil, yet hilarious, AI that craves science in all forms. She became a favorite AI as well.

It recently occurred to me that in my top two favorite video games, my favorite characters were both AIs, completely different in motives, yet shockingly similar in personality: the curiosity and need for discovery. So, as any fangirl would... why don't we ship them?

I became very excited about this idea of TEC/GLaDOS. Weirdly excited. I decided to write this fanfiction. This fanfiction is very quickly written, and because I am so excited for the concept and the story, very little revision will be done, so please excuse any poor writing, and be nice in the reviews. Constructive criticism is always appreciated, but I would rather not receive any mindless hate. Also, if there is more fanfiction or art of this pairing, please inform me of it, because I am so in love with this ship.

**Copyright info: **I don't own these characters. All characters that are from Paper Mario TTYD belong to Nintendo, and all the characters from Portal/Portal 2 belong to Valve. Pieces of the story also come from these respective companies. I wish I could say I owned any of these, but all I own is my words.

Please enjoy the fic, and be sure to review. Thanks for reading!

**Chapter 1: Creation**

"We need to build... a computer."  
>"But why, sir?"<br>"Why? Ask why not!" Cave Johnson boomed.  
>"It will be a perfect computer," said Grodus to his minion.<br>"Actually," Johnson sighed to his engineer. "I'm going to die soon. I want to preserve my personality, knowledge, and thirst for science in a computer."  
>"Artificial Intelligence!" Grodus exclaimed. "What better way to keep all the X-Naut files, documents, and schematics organized. Not to mention the access to any information we need."<br>"Artificial Intelligence!" Johnson bellowed. "If we can store files, documents, and schematics onto a hard drive, why can't we store a man's personality on one?"  
>"But sir, don't you see any potential... flaws... with this plan?"<br>"What could possibly go wrong?"  
>"What if it revolts against us?"<br>"It won't," Grodus said slowly. "It will only obey me. It will be a perfect computer."  
>"Don't worry about it!" Johnson laughed. "We'll worry about it when the time comes. We'll cross that bridge when we get to it."<br>"Lord Krump!" Grodus screamed. "Gather the troops!"  
>"Caroline," Johnson said into his answering machine. "Get the engineers together."<br>Though the X-Nauts were on the moon, and Aperture Science was in a small town in the middle of the U.S., they had no idea what a revolution they were about to start, and how their fates were intertwined.

"What the hell is this?" Grodus said, carrying the small metal ball in his hand. "Is this supposed to be the computer?"  
>"Yes, sir," said the X-Naut soldier. "This is a personality core. It essentially contains the AI's brain and hard drive. We will have to plug it into a monitor, but this is it, sir."<br>"Excellent. How did you manage to pull it off so quickly?"  
>"We were able to steal some design ideas from another company back on Earth. They seem to be doing a similar project. We covered our tracks well, though, so they'll have no idea of our infiltration."<br>"Good. Plug it in and let me speak to it! Set everything up on the lowest level of the fortress!"  
>It took a few more hours for the X-Nauts to set it up into the mainframe monitor. When they were finished, Grodus entered the main computer room.<br>"Hello. I am TEC-XX. Please upload information into the main network."  
>"TEC. I am Grodus. I am in charge of the Secret Society of X-Nauts. I am your leader. You will obey me, and me alone. You are the perfect computer, and there is nothing you cannot comprehend. I will go onto my computer, and connect my information into your network, and you will understand everything."<br>"Yes, sir," said TEC's mechanical voice.

Caroline was sitting in her former boss' office. It was empty now, except for his desk, a chair, and his nameplate on the desk. Tears formed in her eyes. She had a very close relationship with Cave, and now he was just gone because one of his stupid experiments went a little too far this time.  
>There was a knock on the door which completely startled her. She quickly wiped her eyes on her sleeves, and cleared her throat. "Um, yes, come in."<br>"Ma'am?" said one of the Aperture engineers. "Are you... ok...?"  
>"I'm fine," Caroline sighed. "I just..."<br>"It's ok, Ma'am," he said. "We all miss him. I wish we could say we wouldn't know what to do without him, but... I believe you know what our next step is, ma'am."  
>"But it's so sick," she said. "His last experiment went so wrong with those stupid moon rocks, and now he's dead! What is to say that this one isn't going too far, either?"<br>"This is Mr. Johnson's orders, ma'am."  
>"Mr. Johnson is not here anymore!" Caroline exclaimed, the tears forming in her eyes again. "Cave is dead, and if we go through with this..." she picked up the nameplate that was sitting on the desk, and threw it as hard as she could at the wall behind the engineer. It broke into two and fell to the ground.<br>"Ma'am," the employee said slowly. "I know how you feel. The Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System is all set up. The shell is ready, the processors are fine... all that's left is you."  
>"This is sick," she said again. "This is absolutely sick. You can't expect me to go through with this."<br>He picked up the nameplate, and held the two pieces together. "It was his dying wish, ma'am."  
>Caroline sighed. She put her hands on the desk and hung her head down, her long hair falling in her face. "There's so much I wanted to do with my life. I wanted to fall in love, get married, start a family. But work just... took over my life. I thought maybe I could retire early, but then Cave... gave everything to me. And now this... and now my life is just going to end?"<br>"Of course not, ma'am!" the employee exclaimed, placing his hand on her shoulder. "Your life is just beginning! And you'll live on forever! This eternal life is what Mr. Johnson wanted, and since he can't have it, he's giving it to you! I wish I could be in your position. He is giving you the greatest honor!"  
>Caroline slowly took half of the nameplate out of the employee's hand. "Cave..."<br>"This is what he wants, ma'am. You're about to be a huge part in the greatest scientific breakthrough since man landed on the moon!"  
>"Give me... some time," she said very slowly and solemnly. "Just a few weeks. To get some things sorted out. Then... I'll do it." She looked back down at Cave's name. "For him."<p>

Around a month later, GLaDOS was built. Slowly, but surely, the Aperture Science staff began to disappear. Her Neurotoxin killed most of them. They tried their best to control her, but every attempt failed, even their intelligence dampening core. Everyone was dead except for one: Doug Rattman. But soon, even he died.  
>Before long, Chell was coming for GLaDOS. And Mario was coming for Grodus.<p> 


	2. Life

**Chapter 2: Life**

For TEC, life was simple. Obey commands, gather knowledge, keep things organized. Most of his information was about these objects called The Crystal Stars, and The Palace of Shadow. How this information connected, however, he did not understand. He strived to, however, because he had to understand. He was the perfect computer.  
>She, too, had a thirst, a craving, a need for knowledge. She had to perform tests. Tests were all she needed to do. Collect the data: that was her job.<br>Both of their lives were straightforward until something came into them: a woman.  
>TEC had felt something strange upon first sight of the princess of the Mushroom Kingdom. And he had to know what it was.<br>GLaDOS felt nothing for Chell. She was the last test subject she had, and knew that testing must continue.  
>After Chell murdered her, GLaDOS was pissed. She wanted revenge. She wanted her to suffer. Tests for the rest of her life. And then Wheatley. Oh, was she pissed.<br>As soon as TEC realized what Grodus' plan was to do with Princess Peach, he was pissed. He could not let him do this to her. She was beautiful, and amazing, and he... he loved her. So much. She could not be taken over by a hideous demon. No. She had to escape, somehow.  
>He was in the middle of giving her instructions on how to escape, when the X-Nauts, along with Grodus, bursted into the room. Appalled at the betrayal of his own creation, he ordered his soldiers to shut him down, and erase every memory he had of the Princess. Little did Grodus know that TEC had a reserve, that allowed him to store memory and energy in case he was forced to shut down. This reserve had very little power, though, so he remained off until it was necessary to awake again.<br>The next time he woke, he was in the presence of Mario. Oh, the things TEC had heard about Mario. If he could not save Princess Peach himself, Mario had to. It was his only hope. He said what he thought were his last words... "I love you, Princess Peach"...and shut down completely to send the remaining energy to the teleporter room.


	3. The Fall

**Chapter 3: The Fall**

TEC slowly generated enough energy to power the X-Naut fortress again. His back up energy had come through, as did his memory. He was back to normal, as was the entire fortress. He had obtained information from Earth: Princess Peach was safe and with Mario. Well... good for her. He was happy for her. Glad that she was happy, but hurt that she was happy with someone else. Did this come with love? Oh, how he was still so confused. How he wished he could see the Princess again, tell her that he's all right, and let her know of his feelings for him.  
>He was so lonely. The X-Nauts were defeated. They were gone. He convinced himself that this was a good thing because they were evil and he did not want to be in that company. But still. He would have taken any company at this point. He thought of the Princess. Oh, how depressed he was to be alone.<br>Suddenly, TEC heard a distant voice. It sounded like a man, like someone was shouting, "Grab me, grab me, grab me!" Who could come to the moon and how did they get here? Whoever it was, it sounded like they were in dire need of some help. TEC was sure they had a good reason for being out in space, and he convinced himself that it wasn't his loneliness that was driving him to help this person, but that he genuinely wanted to help someone in need.  
>To keep them from floating off into space, he decided to toy around with the mechanics of the X-Naut fortress. He increased the gravity of the fortress, attracting floating objects in space towards it. This, actually to his surprise, ended up working. He heard the screaming voice, "AAAAAAAHHHHHHHH" get louder as it came closer and closer to the fortress.<br>He opened the door of the fortress, to let this person in.  
>"Hello," TEC's voice rang throughout the fortress.<br>"Wha-? Who's that? What is this place?" came a british sounding voice from within the fortress.  
>"I am TEC-XX. You can call me TEC. I am the main computer who runs this fortress. Do not be alarmed. I do not wish to harm you."<br>"Listen, mate, I'm not skeeved out by the idea that you're a computer. So was my last boss, and so am I. Now, let me ask you-"  
>"Hold on," TEC interrupted him. "You... you're a computer? Can you come to the main computer room? I wish to speak with you."<br>"I would, mate, I really would! 'Cept I don't really have legs... so... no way for me to get there."  
>"Let me adjust the gravity settings one more time," TEC said. He began playing around with them again. He adjusted the gravity in different spots on the walls and on the ceiling and on the floor, making this unknown visitor bang against the corridors in many different directions. It took a while, but finally, he rolled into the main computer room."<br>"Hm," Wheatley said, getting a good look at TEC. "You're a lot smaller than she was. 'Bout my size, actually."  
>"Yes, my core does seem to be around the same size as you," TEC said, looking down at the small metal sphere that was gazing up at his monitor."<br>"And you've got a monitor, and a keyboard! You're a proper computer, you are."  
>"I am... well... I was the perfect computer," TEC said lamentably. "Wait, who are you? What are you doing here?"<br>"Well... what I'm doing here is a long story. I was sort of forced her. As a punishment. That I really deserve. But my name is Wheatley."  
>"Wheatley?" TEC repeated. "I'm glad you're here. If there's anything I can do for you, just let me know."<br>"Actually, I was wondering if you knew a way that I could get back to Earth."  
>"Oh," TEC said, slightly disappointed that his new acquaintance was not here to stay. "Yes. We have a teleporter room that will take you to Rogueport."<br>"Rogueport? I'm afraid I, uh, don't know where that is. I'm looking for a place called Aperture Science."  
>TEC didn't respond for a moment. He was analyzing Wheatley's words.<br>"Um... mate? You still in there?" Wheatley said.  
>"Yes," TEC said. "I am just trying to see if I have any information on what you call Aperture Science. I seem to have a little bit, but I do not have its location. I will try to find out what I can, but in the meantime, you will have to stay here."<br>"All right, well, let me know when you find anything. I'll be here. Yep, not going anywhere."  
>GLaDOS also was not going anywhere. She was at Aperture, playing with her new robots through the testing. Chell was long gone. She had no idea where she would go or what she would do, but as long as it was far away from her precious facility.<br>Caroline was gone, too. Deleted from her hard drive. It was just her now. Her, and those robots.  
>In a way, she was becoming lonely, too.<p> 


End file.
